OK, Finally have shell, welder, self all in same place. Have this 2/3 put together cage that needs work. It would probably help if I had painted it, oh, 5 years ago.

So, JV, you think I should rip out and redo? Or can I salvage this thing? I know the main hoop needs an X now instead of the silly stock car cage guy's Y brace. I know the bloody flat plate gussets are evil and I need to manufacture some tacos. I know the halo and front bar fitment is only slightly better than an autopower cage. I know I need to rip the roof off to finish some welds on the top (or do some creative hole saw work).

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY

Drat, it posted already. Well, the floor plates also suck and are scabby looking (time to get out flapper wheel on grinder).

Also, the main hoop sits a bit farther forward than I'd like, but not too much I can do about that without a complete redo.

Is it time for a sawzall or do you guys think I can meet this weeks RA rules with a few more bars (sill bars, bigger floor plates and main hoop diagonals)?

Hope you all get some laughs out of this. This is what happens when you don't have your own garage, try to work by remote control 100 miles away, and enlist roundy round and drag car guys to build rally stuff, even when you give them pictures, diagrams and rule books. But enough of the coulda, woulda, shouldas, time to assemble this thing.

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/12/2006 11:34PM by fiasco.

one or two more pics...

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY

How rusty is the rest of the car?

Oh the rest of the car is tip top. About as rust free as anything in New England gets. Floors are good, rockers good, no real rot anywhere. Probably as good as my black street car.

--Andrew

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY

Put it back in the salt water until the tubing is about 0.030" thick and then get a NASA log book. ;-) Kidding really.

The main hoop diagonal arrangement weirds me out, but I am not a tech guy.
I do own a sawsall, though. And, I have more 1.75 OD exhaust tubing. But you know that.

I can't believe how little non-constructive feedback you've gotten.
Ted

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Ted Mendham
www.rensport.net

I would junk the whole thing. Floor around the reinforcing plates will likely need repair, bizarre reinforcements should be removed, rear shock towers could probably be plated, and the gap on the A pillar is bigger than mine. Maybe keep the main hoop?

I figured JV would have had a stroke by now and shipped the Kevvie bat to me with a note that said "bash over your own head repeatedly". But apparently he's busy building my front strut tubes or arranging shipping to get his 96 back to the west coast before it ends up being rallycrossed...

I need to go get me a Sawzall.

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY

fiasco Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> But apparently he's busy...arranging shipping to get his 96 back to the
> west coast before it ends up being rallycrossed...

Should I stop by with the tow dolly night before, or morning of next month's event

Don't mention tow dolly...he'll want you on I-90 tomorrow morning!

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY

tedm Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> I can't believe how little non-constructive
> feedback you've gotten.
> Ted
Ted that sounds sorta like a double negative so I'm puzzled----
should we be heaping MORE non-constructive feedback?

I mean should we be offer less constructive feedback?

Here's some feed back:
cut out the one from base of main hoop, replace it with one going to where the stresses are (the top shock mounting)
Cut out the truely beeeezarrroid Y shit in the main hoop and the horisontal bar.
Do some shallow diagonal from main hoop to the tunnel.
Do belt bars in the gap of the rear stays and X bar.

Get a wire cup brush and wire brush the foot plate area for main hoop and examine carefully.
A bit of muriatic acid (IF NEUTRALIZED WHEN YOU'RE DONE) diluted will clean the area but you must flush and dry and then get some PAINT on the bare shit.

Get some strips of emery in 180-220 grit and wrap around the tube and do the "shoe-shine" number on the rest of the tubes, they'll clean up fine.
It IS easier than aggle grindering the whole thing.

Cut out the side window like God intended the cars to look like.

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John Vanlandingham
Sleezattle, WA, USA

Vive le Prole-le-ralliat

www.rallyrace.net/jvab
CALL +1 206 431-9696
Remember! Pacific Standard Time
is 3 hours behind Eastern Standard Time.

Yes, good ideas. Thank you.

I figure if the foot plates are a bit too scabby, I can do some creative cutting and make "foot boxes" on the bottom.

What do you think on the front hoop stuff? I know the fit to the a-pillars stinks...is it worth hacking out and refitting/replacing, or should I just make some boffo looking swiss cheese gussets at the a-pillars?

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Andrew Steere
Lyndeborough, NH
KB1PJY

Andrew, after attending the Wicked Big (subaru) Meat this past weekend I would suggest a couple of changes.

First, you need to clean allll the tubes...the chrome plating will stick better.

Second, I see no provision in your design for Lambo style doors...please address.

And third, ditch all that cross-bar shit in the back. There is no way the dirty-ho-car-show girls are going to be able to swing around on your cage with all that crap in the way.


Non-constructive enough?

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She's screamn' fer eet!
Rallyho
Mike White
http://www.facebook.com/rallyhomotorsports

How about starting fresh on the cage? Does some firm across the (Atlantic) pond have one of those nifty homologated pre-bent pre-profiled cage kits collecting dust? I would think they would be ready to give something like that away for an old Ford, seing as though everyone is throwing money at funky Asians these days.

Anyone got connections at Custom Cages or Safety Devices or where-ever?

JV, I didn't mean to confuse. I did expect more non-constructive criticism.

And Andrew may not think that spending any money at all is very constructive.

Ted Mendham

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Ted Mendham
www.rensport.net

Hahaha. 470 GBP for Custom Cages one. And don't go discounting them just yet. Check out the PassionFord forum from the UK. Sierra 3 dr and Sapphires use the same cage and there are TONS of them still around over there. Not a ton of rally cars, but a bit and quite a few road cars. I'd be willing to say there are possibly even more Sierra race cars in the UK than we have Impreza rally cars here. Maybe.

Oh, and the 470 GBP is pre customs and shipping costs. Checkpoint Racing, as mentioned previously can get them. As I imagine Safe Drives probably can as well. Checkpoint though gets it through Demon Tweeks, where they've done 10s of thousands of dollars of orders in the last year through so you'd save a bit in the overseas shipping. Though they are to the point of having enough inventory that they may start ordering in crate/sea travel quantity adding a bit of lead time. That's why my DT pedal box cost less or close to what DT sells it before shipping, meaning I saved 40-100 depending upon customs costs on the bit.

When I was a DT dealer I sold a friend a Custom Cages FIA Spec cage for an Evo 7 RS for around $1400 delivered if I recall correctly. That included shipping and customs fees though.

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Grant Hughes



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/24/2006 04:24PM by NoCoast.